


Neurosis

by comealongpixie



Category: Heroes (TV), The Vampire Diaries (TV)
Genre: Crossover Pairings, F/M, underage kinda? they meet when care is seventeen but dont get together until she's eighteen
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-11-04
Updated: 2017-11-04
Packaged: 2019-01-29 12:12:41
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,471
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12630831
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/comealongpixie/pseuds/comealongpixie
Summary: Peter threw himself off a building...allegedly.Caroline is in the middle of a psychotic break...allegedly.When the two of them end up in the same psychiatric facility, they work to understand the truth of what brought them there--and learn to navigate this new, unbelievable world together.





	Neurosis

**Author's Note:**

> I just wanna be upfront with you guys...this fic has been on hiatus for a couple years. I'm moving it to ao3 so I can have everything in one place, and if there's enough interest I might continue it, but...yeah.

“Caroline, breakfast is ready.”

 

The voice doesn’t sound like her mother. Even if it did, it’s not like her mother ever makes her breakfast or wakes her up or anything. She sits up, throwing the covers off to find herself somewhere that is definitely not her room, in a place that is definitely not her house, with someone who is definitely not her mother standing by the door. This all happens in a second, and then the truth hits her in the next. 

 

_ Oh, right. I’m in a crazy house.  _

 

Not by her own choosing, thank you very much. It was after the Founder’s Day party. If she’s being honest with herself, she’s still not quite sure what happened that night. Just that by the time Mrs. Lockwood gave her toast, Caroline’s mother had figured out her relationship with Damon, and by the end of the night it had all come out--including the marks on her skin that even she couldn’t explain.

 

By the next day, she was in a psych’s office trying to explain the gaps in her memory from the past few weeks. By the end of that day, she was crying. Add in two days in a temporary psych ward at Mystic Falls general, and then an ambulance ride to Aspen Springs Hospital, a specialized mental health clinic.  And how here she is, four (five?) days after that fateful party, locked up like some kind of criminal. 

 

She runs a hand through her hair and drags herself out of bed--not especially difficult, since the bed is something like a thin cot propped up on some ancient, creaking metal frame. When she looks to the door, the nurse is gone, so she grabs a sweatshirt from the floor--for some reason, it’s always freezing in the god-forsaken place--pulls it on, and goes into the hallway. 

 

It’s her first morning at Aspen; she arrived at seven last night and promptly fallen asleep in her room. Not like she’d had a reason to be tired. She’d spent the previous few days in a different hospital, in bed, answering question after question. It’s just a lot of change in a very short timeframe, an emotional expense, but she doesn’t think it’s an excuse for so much exhaustion. Maybe sleeping is just a better alternative to living in the real world, where she’s in a  _ goddamn mental hospital. _

 

The breakfast trays are laid out on a big table just outside the main office. She takes the one marked with her name, turns around, and then hesitates. To the left is the lounge, a big room with a bunch of couches, a TV that only has five channels, a shelf full of VHS tapes (which apparently still exist), and a handful of other patients she’s not sure she’s ready to confront yet. 

 

To the right is an unmarked door with a small window, distinguishing it from the patients’ rooms. She knows she’s allowed there because she’s seen a few other patients go in and out. She goes over and peeks inside the window. Another patient is there, picking at his own food, but it’s otherwise empty. Better than the crowd in the lounge, she decides, and goes inside. 

 

Despite her nerves, she holds her head high as she sits down. Caroline the person has always been a little neurotic, a little control-freaky. Caroline Forbes the Persona, however, is confident, cool, in control. Or she had been at one point, in a time that seems like years ago, and she would be again. 

 

The other patient’s head snaps up at the sound of the door falling shut. By her estimation, he looks to be in his early twenties, with brown hair and big green eyes. He’s cute, she decides. You know, for a crazy person. Then again, it’s not like she’s in any place to judge. 

 

He nods at her in greeting, a hint of a smile on his lips, although she thinks that might just be leftover muscle memory from when he lived outside the hospital and had to smile at people. Still, maybe it’s her own muscle memory, but she can’t help but smile back a tiny bit as she sits across from him. The smile is quickly wiped away, however, when she looks down at her tray. Her nose wrinkles in disgust. 

 

“What’s wrong?” the man across from her asks. He sounds vaguely amused. 

 

“French toast,” she replies. She wonders why she didn’t notice before. She probably just wasn’t awake enough. 

 

“You know, you can tell them. They ask about your food preferences when you come in. They have a form and everything.”

 

“Well, you’ll have to excuse me for not being up for paperwork after--” she cuts herself off. No reason to take out her shit on this random stranger. “I was tired,” she finishes. 

 

“You’re right. Sorry.” 

 

It’s not his fault, but he seems like the type to contest that point, and she doesn’t have the energy to fight about it, so she shrugs. “It’s fine.”

 

There’s a pause as she picks up a fork and stabs a sausage link with it. Then he speaks up again. 

 

“I have pancakes. You wanna trade?”

 

She looks up, narrowing her eyes in suspicion, as if it’s a trick question. “Is that allowed?”

 

He grins crookedly. “I don’t see anyone here to stop us,” he says, and once again, she can’t keep herself from smiling back. 

 

“Okay.” She slides her tray towards him. “I’m Caroline.”

 

“I’m Peter. Nice to meet you.”

 

“Yeah...you too.” And it’s weird, given the curcumstance, but she means it. 

  
  


“I can see we have a lot of new people today, so why don’t we go around and introduce ourselves? My name is Leslie. I’m a therapist here at Aspen Springs. I’ve worked here for about three years. So let’s go around, tell everyone your name, and if you feel comfortable enough, why you’re here. Let’s start with you.”

 

Peter looks up from the table, but the therapist is looking at the patient across from him, an older woman who doesn’t look old enough for the oxygen tank next to her.

 

“My name is Norma. I’m 65 years old and I’m here because it’s never too late to get a fresh start. I spent my whole life trapped in one marriage to the next…” 

 

Unlike the others, who keep their heads down and--he feels safe to assume--their ears closed, Peter listens, nodding along to her story. At least someone is happy to be there. 

 

Next is the tall blonde girl that came in at breakfast. She looks up as Leslie calls on her, then shrugs. 

 

“My name is Caroline Forbes.” She uses a very different tone than she did with him over breakfast, and he gets the sense that her name means something in whatever town she’s from. There’s a beat where she seems to be deliberating over whether to share more, and then finally--just as he can see Leslie’s gearing up to call on someone else--Caroline adds “and I’m having a psychotic break. Allegedly.”

 

This gets a few chuckles from the room, and even Peter has to look down to cover his smile. 

 

A few more people go next (mostly addicts) and then it’s his turn. He looks up. 

 

_ My name is Peter Petrelli, _ he wants to say.  _ You may have heard of my brother, Nathan Petrelli, who’s running for congress in New York City, who sent me down here after I jumped off a building trying to fly. Pretty sure he flew up and caught me but he keeps denying it, and maybe he’s right and I am crazy and between him and my mom I ended up here, allegedly because it’s one of the best facilities in the country but probably more because it’s far, far away from my brother’s campaign, and I’m a liability. As usual. _

 

Instead, though, all he says is “I’m Peter. I threw myself off a roof.”

 

He glances across the room at Caroline, trying to gauge her reaction, though he isn’t sure why. Maybe because she is, as of this morning, the closest thing he has to a friend here. Though he’s been here a few days, he’s kept to himself for the most part. He hasn’t even been to group therapy yet, until today; the only reason he’s here is because he and Caroline happened to still be in the room when the other patients started shuffling in. She was the first real conversation he’s had in days. 

 

Her head snaps up at the words “threw myself off a roof,” and she meets his eyes. Then she smiles a little--uncertain, but ultimately sympathetic. He smiles back. 

 

This little “vacation” is still terrible, but maybe it’ll be significantly less terrible than he thought. 


End file.
